1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a crash pad for an automotive interior and an apparatus for manufacturing the crash pad, and, more particularly, to a crash pad for an automotive interior which is adapted to prevent a hinge portion of an air-bag door for a passenger seat from being broken at the time of deployment of a passenger air-bag and an apparatus for manufacturing the crash pad.
2. Description of Related Art
A crash pad is a panel made of resin material for finishing a front area of a vehicle interior. For a vehicle equipped with a passenger air-bag, the crash pad is provided with a passenger air-bag door to allow the passenger air-bag to be deployed therethrough.
As shown in FIG. 1, as a rule, the air-bag door 2 is configured such that an area thereof is defined by a tear line 3 and a hinge portion 4 which are formed on the crash pad 1. When the tear line 3 of the air-bag door 2 is torn and the passenger air-bag door 2 is pushed out by the passenger air-bag at the time of deployment of the air-bag, the hinge portion 2 may break and the door 2 may separate from the crash pad 1 due to a momentarily strong expansionary force of the air-bag.
The hinge portion refers to a connecting or boundary region between the door pushed out by the air-bag and the crash pad. The fact itself that the door separates from the crash pad toward a passenger during the deployment thereof may give rise to a consumer's complaint, and thus initial deployment of the air-bag into a predetermined normal shape cannot be achieved at all. Furthermore, the opening of the crash pad, resulting from the separation of the air-bag door, may disfigure the appearance of the crash pad, and the passenger may be injured by sharp edges (the tear line or the hinge portion) of the air-bag door separated from the crash pad.
The information disclosed in this Background of the Invention section is only for enhancement of understanding of the general background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art already known to a person skilled in the art.